West Wind Sober Living

Outpatient Program

Shame Resilience

Shame resilience theory defines the concept of shame and also how people can cope with shame. Shame can be an overwhelming emotion that is detrimental to personal growth and development. Shame resilience teaches individuals how to overcome these powerful feelings of shame through developing contrasting feelings of empathy, empowerment, connection, and freedom. There are four important steps to this theory the first one being understanding how vulnerability leads to shame. The second step is identifying external causes of shame. The third step consists of developing connections with others through giving and receiving empathy. In the final step the individual talks about and analyzestheir feelings of shame. Through shame resilience individuals can uncover their shame instead of keeping it hidden.